With Eyes a Verdant Green
by AleraeEirtoren
Summary: It's vampire fiction, I know. I couldn't help myself. This was an idea that just sort of hit me... I may or may not go further with it. For now it's a one-shot. Summary: Shizuru, ancient, powerful, and just awoken from centuries of slumber, spies the lovely Natsuki Kruger at a royal ball. What else could she do but steal her away?


**With Eyes a Verdant Green**

She looked like a waif, standing there against the dark wall.

Such a statement, however, dares not deny her beauty. Hair the color of midnight, eyes a verdant green. Skin so pale it stood in stark contrast to most everything else in that dimmed room, down to the very dress she wore: small and black. She glowed.

I watched her and wondered: what is she doing in a place like this? Some part of me ached; hoping she was not some expensive paramour, though I nevertheless considered the bleak possibility. What a sad existence that would be, to be composed of such beauty, and yet never possess it. The delicate flower of her youth would be one to be bought and enjoyed by others; never to be loved for its true nature.

When our eyes met, did she see me for what I am? Did the slightest inkling strike her of how sweetly her lifeblood would taste upon my tongue? Ah, and sweet she would have been, this delicate bloom, to whet my thirst. The mere sacrilege of the act would have sent me reeling with pleasure.

Thus, I laid not a hand on her... yet.

This goes not to say that I am chaste, or that I avoid such quaint indulgence. Her pulse rang in my ears, even from across the dim and din of a hall of dancers, their synchronized twirls all at once mesmerizing and mechanical. Oh, how I wanted her! Her blood sang a melody my own ears would never hear again, never from another soul but she, this green-eyed dame. I dared not simply kill such a creature as she, this petite creator of such a song. I dared not.

In a thought, I surreptitiously urged her to approach me. I had every intention of stealing her away, regardless of whether she were a king's daughter or well-paid escort. My kind regards not the whims of mortal society, and the prospect of us beginning to do so remains ever doubtful.

I felt contentment, relishing in my ability to influence the human mind. I left the room of human dancers and cast my presence on an unoccupied balcony, the moon's silver luminescence gently caressing my skin. My hands were as cold and hard as the marble rail upon which they rested, cold and hard, cold and un-living.

Did she feel fear as she stepped in to the moonlight behind me? I believe she did, from the luscious sound of her quick-beating heart. I fought with myself to retain lucidity.

_Hello_, she whispered in a voice low and feminine, as she approached. Ah, the rush of her pulse. The sweetest torture is the anticipation of pleasure. Heat poured from her in waves, flowed in to me, wrapped about me. My senses were so sharp that, if the urge struck me, I could have seen _through_ her, down to muscles, blood and bone.

_Good evening_, and to her I knew my voice must sound like bells, nature, sweet singing and pink noise. No hunter casts a greater spell on her prey than the vampire. _Tell me your name_.

But oh, she did more than this. She softly stepped to my side, and looked demurely in to my eyes, and I scented the resulting rush of adrenaline. Did my gaze frighten her? If so, her face nevertheless remained articulate, soft, passionate... _Natsuki_, she says.

_Natsuki_, I taste the name, finding it delectable, _I commend your courage in following a stranger to this secluded place_. Adrenaline, heat. So human, and so very alive she was. And how her blood sang! Beautiful girl, many of my kind would see you as naught but a prettily-dressed warm meal. But oh, how much more you are than such an… _inhumane_ idea? Sweet girl, I had every intention of stealing you away.

… Thus, you lie in my coffin this bright day. You stir not a breath, but will rise come evening, frozen forever in your beauty. You will be mad for blood; thirsty, twisted, and filled the the rage of the newborn. And I, sated from a fresh meal caught in the wee hours of this morning, await you.

* * *

**You Capture me Unheeding**

_The stone around us shields us from the sun, love_, I say to the coffin, _There will be light, but it is merely the fire_, I smile to myself, methodically brushing my hair, colored a honeyed bronze, _Old habits die hard, you see_.

This blood, ah, it is warm. The flush it creates in my cheeks generates such a feeling of pleasure that I feel the need to stretch, catlike, then tilt my head back and meditate upon it. _Natsuki, my beauty, tonight I will have you drink of me, for it is my blood which shall make you strong._ I feel such a need to tell her my thoughts that in this moment it gives me pause. I have always been so… self-absorbed. But upon seeing her, in that blessed instant, I had felt the insistent tugging of this love for her. When I had taken her, the river of her thoughts and memories had flowed through me, and I felt her stubbornness, her insatiable pride. I felt myself wanting to know more of her, even after the contents of her mind had become known to me. I remember wanting to know what she would become.

Yes, I admit I had loved her instantly. _Natsuki Kruger, lovely flower of one-and-twenty years, highborn, talented, universally desired, unwillingly betrothed - I welcome you_. The warmth of the hearth feels luxurious, coupling delightfully with the soft material of the rug before it, upon which I move to lay. I gaze at my coffin, its ancient, heavy black marble, my name carved on the side in a script long-forgotten, under reliefs of gods long-dead. _Ten men would be required to lift the lid, Natsuki. But you, my love, you shall have no difficulty._

Her scent is still in the air. When first I brought her here, her screams had also filled these darkened halls of mine, and my un-beating heart had felt heavy then, for the pain she'd felt was immense, to say the least. She simply needs rest now.

I feel my smile again as I lose myself to thought, my eyes relaxed and somewhat lidded in the low light. Her language, English, it is called, tastes exotic upon my tongue. And what a delight it had been for me to awaken after these many years of slumber to find this ambitious new world! I had awoken in this sanctuary of mine, knowing it as hidden in the land of the tribes called Rus, only to find myself in a new country altogether. _Rossiya_, I'd heard the people say. Their Emperor, as they'd sung him, is Aleksandr II.

_I have slept long here, Natsuki._ I had, of course, decided to travel upon seeing all the grand newness around me. The length of my slumber had astounded me upon learning the date - _Nearly seven-hundred years!_ By the time I wandered in to England, the year was one-thousand eight-hundred and seventy after the birth of the Lord. On the throne, now, sits proud Queen Victoria. _You would have been familiar with the queen, then, Natsuki? You could have inherited a Duchy, after all._

And the technology! The way their massive beasts of black metal would roar, snorting great and furious black plumes of smoke, careening on metal wheels on a metal road, pulling behind them massive arrays of cargo. Machines in this brave new world exist everywhere, and for every purpose! From food, to clothing, to books, to creating contained gas-light, these machines, as I watched, worked tirelessly. This world, from what I could understand through my observance, had left previous epochs far behind it.

Yes, the world flowers now… and quite certainly in to something new. The children of this civilization shall inherit such dizzying possibilities - and as a being who has seen many changes in the words and ways of mankind, I must admit that this time period I have woken in to fascinates me endlessly.

My musings are broken by a stirring in the air. A short glance at my newest material acquisition, an enchanting mechanical timepiece, alerts me to the onset of nightfall. Natsuki stirs once more within, then groans softly. I feel a rush, a shiver, _Come, darling_, I say softly, _Lift the lid_.

And my fledgling does not disappoint. Within minutes of her awakening, I already find myself impressed by her strength. The sound of stone grinding against stone fills the chamber, and a white hand reaches up through the widening gap between lid and base, pushing them apart just enough for her body to gracefully sidle out. I remain in my reclined position as she, clad in thin silks, moves smoothly into a crouch on the floor, and regards me with nothing short of bloodlust.

Her breathing, so pronounced… her stance, so deliciously hostile… so ready for the hunt… _Natsuki_, I whisper lovingly, slipping my own fine robe down, revealing my neck and shoulder. Her mouth opens slightly, revealing sharp canines, and her eyes, lidded with need, look upon me with such raw ferocity I feel myself tremble. She minutely leans forward to take in my scent, then lets out a breathy, intoxicated moan. _Natsuki_, I push my hair behind me, my blood quickening in response to her, then brush my hand slowly down the skin of my neck, _Natsuki… come_.


End file.
